HC Deb 06 December 1927 vol 211 cc1336-50

Whereupon Mr. SPEAKER, pursuant to the Order of the House, of 8th November, proposed the Question, "That this House do now adjourn."

Mr. SAKLATVALA

I hope the House will be indulgent enough to allow me to give an explanation of the questions arising out of the action of the India Office regarding the cancellation of the visa to my passport. Apart from the personal aspect, the matter has a very important underlying. principle for passports for British subjects travelling in British territory, and also as regards the great temptation that a Minister may have to get round the ordinary course of law and to exercise his political bias by using the passport instrument as an instrument against an individual who has no further appeal against the Minister's decision. The Noble Lord, the Under-Secretary of State for India, during Question Time the other day unfortunately misunderstood me when he thought that I was charging him as a Minister of the Crown with a deliberate misstatement. That was far from my mind, and I hope the Noble Lord will accept that assurance.

He will appreciate the position in which he has placed me when for months, after persistent correspondence, after questions in the Indian Assembly, the Minister of the Crown absolutely declines to give me any reason for his action or to state to me the charge of which I am convicted and punished; and when he puts to this House statements which he has received from his subordinate officers he puts me in the very bad position of having to describe those statements as gross misstatements if I find them so from my knowledge of the facts. I did not thereby convey an allegation that the Minister himself was making a false charge against me, but only that he was repeating something that was untrue from what was supplied to him.

There is one further point in regard to this bar which has been placed against me in regard to my passport. The Noble Lord, in reply to the right hon. and gallant Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme (Colonel Wedgwood) stated, when this matter was previously discussed: as long as I represent the Secretary of State for India I can assure the hon. Member that I shall make no discrimination between persons inside and outside this House on the matter of passports to India."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 28th November, 1927; cols. 13 and 14, Vol. 211.] It is not a question of discrimination. We all realise the fact that we take the consequences in law for our own actions, whether we are Members of Parliament or not; but it cannot be denied that there is this difference that, like some other officials of the State and like some other persons associated with other organisations, we who are associated with the British Parliament, and the House of Commons in particular have, as a matter of duty in carrying out our functions, to travel in various parts of the British Empire and to investigate certain matters, and I suggest that Ministers would be acting quite wrongly if they entirely disregarded that duty which de- volves upon us. If we are carrying out our duties wrongly we may be prosecuted, imprisoned and punished for it, but we ought not to be prevented from carrying out our duties because of the personal view of the Minister, especially when we have a Party system. A Minister is not an infallible being. It is quite a different thing when a jury or a Court delivers judgment; but for a Minister to act upon his own judgment, especially in a country where we have a party system, is an entirely unjust course to take, and I ask from the House protection in those circumstances, and not for any special protection.

I am in a very difficult position tonight, because there are many things which are fundamentally wrong in principle in the action taken by the Foreign Secretary on the advice of the Secretary of State for India. Unfortunately, the India Office has thrown out such a lot of incorrect statements—I unhesitatingly call them gross misstatements—that I am compelled first to put the truth before the House. I would contend that, even if everything that the India Office has said or has believed after the reports of their subordinates, were true, that would not constitute a valid reason for stopping a British citizen's passport for going to some part of British territory. Before I leave that argument, I suppose the House will permit me to state the facts as they are.

The Under-Secretary gave three reasons last time. The first was the objectionable character of my speeches, the second was some preface that he found attached to a book, and the third was a telegram, which he described in a peculiar manner, sent in certain circumstances. I do again put it, without meaning to give any personal offence to the Noble Lord, that taking his information from his Department, and following his advice blindly, without the elementary sense of justice of asking the accused person, he has simply let himself into a fix, where I hope he will find it difficult, for the sake of his personal honour, to continue to remain. I would take the last two points first, and I will treat the first point in the end. He said—and these are his words—that the character of my speeches Led the Government of India and my Noble Friend"— that is, the Secretary of State for India— to apprehend a breach of tranquillity. Then he goes on: My Noble Friend's apprehensions were confirmed by the fact— and then he states what were the charges. I put it to the House that, in plain English, it can only mean that my speeches were of such a character that the Noble Lord had apprehensions of a breach of tranquillity, and then when he says those apprehensions were confirmed by my two acts, that can only mean that a breach of tranquillity did take place after my two acts. That is entirely untrue, and there is not a particle of justification for giving this House to believe that the Noble Lord's apprehensions were confirmed by anything that I did after coming to this country. I would ask the House to bear in mind that it is no argument for the stopping of a man's passports to India that a man can stop here and do something, but I would point out that the way in which the case is put to this House is a most unfair and unjust one, when it is said that those apprehensions were confirmed. If the Ministers came to that position from any reports, then I must say they have not carried out their duties as they ought to carry them out, because there have been no disturbances or breaches of tranquillity even after the two alleged acts, and so I say the manner in which this was put to the House is altogether unjustifiable.

I now come to the two acts. The Noble Lord says that those apprehensions were confirmed by the fact that after the hon. Member returned to England, he prefixed to an anonymous pamphlet which, inter alia, repeatedly emphasised the use of force by the Chinese Nationalists, these words: 'All I have to say to the people of India on this subject is, "Go and do likewise."' Later on, in answer to a supplementary question, the Noble Lord said: The hon. Member for North Battersea has never denied that he wrote the preface to this pamphlet. His words almost amounted to the fact of my writing the preface to the pamphlet, and he says that I never denied it. That was the first time, the very first time, I had been told that I had written it. The question I am asking the House to follow rather closely, if they will do so in fairness and justice, is this, my first complaint is that sufficient investigation was not made. When a responsible person like a Member of Parliament goes to investigate into the conduct of officers of the Crown and is charged by a secret report of a subordinate official, the least that can be done is to ask the hon. Member whether he has done it. There were grounds for investigation. The pamphlet is anonymous; that is the first reason. Secondly, the Government are trying their best to discover the author of the anonymous pamphlet, and surely they would have said: "If Saklatvala wrote the preface to it he knows the author, or he does not know anything about the preface which he is alleged to have written." There was every ground for investigation. The case was presented to this House in an entirely unfair manner, even to say that a preface is written, or that I wrote it. The author of the pamphlet does not say that I have written the preface. Nobody who has ever written a book, or read a book, can take this pamphlet and call what the Noble Lord calls a preface, supposed to be written by me. The form of it makes it perfectly clear that neither the Secretary of State for India nor any of his officials were justified in calling it a preface written by me. It is difficult for me to produce in words the exact form and appearance in which it is written. Here is the anonymous pamphlet. There is a little square in a framework, and there is a sentence put in in inverted commas. I think the Noble Lord has a copy of it.

The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for INDIA (Earl Winterton)

Yes.

11.0 p.m.

Mr. SAKLATVALA

If I could show it to any hon. Member of the House who is accustomed to reading pamphlets or books or prefaces, never mind writing them, they would see that it is quite unjust to say that I have written the preface. It is a sentence culled from one of my speeches, or from my private conversation or correspondence, from somewhere, and put on to this pamphlet, and for a responsible Minister of State to say that this is a preface written by me, then get hold of me and hang me at once, without trial or investigation, is exactly how the India Office treat Indians. For the Government, with their judicial officers, with the whole of their paraphernalia of Law Officers, to come to this stupid conclusion and to call it a preface written by me, is entirely untrue. This pamphlet as it stands was never known to me. This pamphlet as it was printed was never sent to me. I was not requested to read the preface. I had not written a preface nor does the author say I have written a preface. A sentence is here in inverted commas and that is called a preface by the Secretary of State for India. The Under-Secretary said "Why did I not refute it? How can I refute a thing when I have not the faintest idea that anything requires refutation? Was it known in England? I doubt it very much, because as soon as the pamphlet was published it was "pinched." The Government deprived the public of the opportunity of reading it and passing remarks about it. In between bouts of my work and my unfortunate illness I did hear from my secretary later on, towards the end of September, that two or three copies of the pamphlet were sent to me, addressed to me at the House of Commons, anonymously, without anything in them, and I began to look at it then, not because of the preface or anything at all, but because it was forming part of a case of sedition against a young Englishman—the first time, as far as my memory goes, that an Englishman has been charged with sedition against British rule in India, because for the first time he happens to be an Englishman belonging to the Socialist movement. He was not a member of the Communist party but of the Socialist movement.

A day, or perhaps a couple of days, before the Minister brought this subject forward in the House, the decision in this case was not given, and at any rate, if I were even ignorant of the fact that I should refute it, the Minister of the Crown ought to know that no one can go and refute something in a pamphlet on the subject of a very serious charge against someone. Not only was it a serious charge, but the man was not released on bail; he was kept for six weeks in prison before his trial. It was said to be a most serious offence that was going to issue in a sentence of transportation for life, and most exaggerated descriptions were given by the Government prosecutor. Then the Secretary of State and the Under-Secretary very gravely asked the House why I did not, when the proceedings were still in progress, say something about the pamphlet, though that would certainly and undoubtedly prejudice the minds of any judges. But, apart from that, it would never dawn upon anyone. What am I to search for in the whole world, from my birth until to-day? It has been mentioned that the pamphlet contained a sentence about civil war and the reign of force in China, and the words "Go thou and do likewise." A father might give his son a life of Napoleon and say to him, "I hope you will be like Napoleon." Would that be seditious? Napoleon made war on England.

Without any sense or rhyme or reason or investigation they stopped me from going to India, and they try to make this House believe that an Indian who uttered the words "Go do likewise" is a most dangerous person to enter Indian territory. I have an Indian newspaper containing a speech by a gentleman who is a persona grata with the Government and who helps the Government in enabling them to make blood-thirsty speeches about communal differences and divisions in India. This speech was made before the Government had confiscated or tried to confiscate my passport—because I do not believe even now they are legally right. I do not believe their action is constitutional or even legal. The newspaper says that this gentleman who was the last speaker, spoke for more than an hour and a half. He urged every Moslem to carry a lathi"— that is a big stick— and to keep a knife in his pocket and to eat beef to gain muscular strength. The Moslem women, he said, should not wear costly gold ornaments, but instead always keep knives with them. A man can deliver a speech in India asking people to carry knives and he can stay in India, but because somebody gets hold of a pamphlet on Chinese civil war and a sentence is quoted "Go do likewise," therefore another person cannot go to India. Worse still, the Englishman who wrote the pamphlet which the Government describe as seditious and dangerous was brought before a Court of law, and the Judge and jury have laughed out of Court the contention of the Secretary of State and have discharged the accused. Thus the man who wrote the pamphlet can stay in India. The Judge and jury have declared that there is no danger in it, but the man, who in the imagination of a hasty-minded Secretary of State, has said something about that book is dangerous and is not allowed to go to India. Now comes the other point. Secondly, he sent in July a telegram conveying congratulations to an individual who had recruited a body of armed volunteers styled soldiers of the republican army of Nagpur and who had consequently been convicted on a charge of sedition."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 28th November, 1927; col. 13, Vol. 211.] I submit that the Under-Secretary of State for India is not a prosecuting counsel. Prosecuting counsel might be justified in misrepresenting or exaggerating cases, but I think it was very unfair for the Under-Secretary, with the facts before him, to have put that sentence to the House. The House trusts him to lay before them the facts. I cannot get complete copies, but I have here incomplete copies of leading newspapers in Calcutta, Bombay and Madras—the "Forward" of Calcutta, the "National Herald" and "Bombay Chronicle" of Bombay, and the "Swarajya" of Madras. I would pass on the whole bunch of them. The man who was prosecuted was the president of an extreme pacifist society, a Quaker of Quakers. It was the movement which Gandhi started even on top of what he called his non-violent, non-co-operation movement. From the first day of the news of the arrest, the newspapers had given great headlines to say that this was a pacifist movement. I am not going to quote at length, but there are newspapers from day to day each and every one of which said that it was a technical breach of the law to expose the partiality of the laws made in India as between white men and Indians. I would quote just one sentence from the speech of the Congress Leader who came specially to investigate this matter. He said: He has clinched the issue to the release of Bengal detenus and organised civil disobedience of the Arms Act for that purpose. The All-India Congress Committee owes a debt to the country now to take it as an All-India question. There is not a single newspaper which from the first moment to the last day of the trial, and even for a couple of months subsequent to the trial, had not taken it as nothing else than the passive resistance of an extreme pacifist as a protest against the unjust character of a certain law when he took that action. Some of the accused, who merely apologised to the Government and said, "We will not do it again," were released, and 80 persons walked in the streets a month after the trial and challenged the Government on the same issue, and no action was taken against them. In Madras simultaneously there are reports in the paper to the effect that two persons walked in the streets with swords, and the people garlanded their swords, and there was no movement of armed volunteers for the purpose of killing; there was no such thing as armed recruits. At the same time there was another State prisoner who was released, and the whole of the country was honouring that prisoner. My telegram—I have not kept a copy of it—on which the Secretary of State took action, was a protest against the treatment of one man who happened to be a Parsee. It is the policy of the Government to pursue venomously, and with a spirit of vindictiveness, any Parsee who dares to go against the British Government, because they want to present to the world that the Parsees are worshippers of British rule; and while several women following the same procession were fined 10 rupees, and, when they refused to pay, were given a penalty of 15 days' imprisonment, this Parsee was punished by four years' rigorous imprisonment.

My telegram was to convey congratulations to the Sikh prisoner, who was unjustly imprisoned, and who, from pressure of public opinion, was released, and, secondly, to express my detestation at the barbarous and savage sentence of four years on this prisoner, and to convey my congratulations on the fighting spirit he had shown in carrying out civil disobedience against an unjust law. The Secretary of State knows all these facts, and he ought to resign if he does not. For the Under-Secretary to say that I sent a telegram of congratulation to someone who was raising armed forces is really misleading the House, and he is not carrying out his duties towards the House in a proper manner. The last point raised by the Under-Secretary was that my speeches were of an objectionable character. If my speeches were of an objectionable character, there would have been prosecutions. If there had been no prosecutions, there are English newspapers in India which have been bitterly opposed to me for the last 20 years. They would have created an uproar and exposed the dangerous character of my speeches. I challenge the Secretary of State to say there was one article produced, even in the most bitterly hostile Press about the dangerous character of my speeches. If anything, I was charged by the English papers with being so cunning that in India I explained Communism in a constitutional manner only.

I do not consider that the Under-Secretary, by making some further charges, can wipe out this question. I appeal to the House to demand from the Government the production of all the papers which the Indian Assembly demanded and which they refused, and of the correspondence between the Indian Government and the Secretary of State for India; and I am confident that, if impartial investigation is made with the assistance of some Members of the House, it will be found that it is nothing but a continuation of the policy which has been pursued to persecute me for the last 15 years of my life. The India Office has been in constant communication with my family, and my family has been in constant communication with the India Office; they kept me as a pauper and prevented me going to India. Now, with the assistance of my hon. Friends, I find a way to India. It is all in accord with the policy of personal vindictiveness against a Parsee who dares to explain the real and true character of the tyranny in India called the British rule.

Earl WINTERTON

A short time is left to me to deal with the case, and I want to make it clear at the outset that anything I have to say on behalf of the Secretary of State for India is directed, not against the hon. Gentleman personally, but purely in respect of the views which he holds in regard to India, not in regard to this country. I shall endeavour in the 12 minutes at my disposal to answer the charges that he has brought that his passport has been refused on insufficient grounds. In the first instance, may I explain what the procedure in this matter has been. The Secretary of State for India accepted the recommendation of the Government o£ India that, in view of the speeches made by the hon. Member, and the action he subsequently took when he went to India last year, it was undesirable that he should be given a visa for his passport to India. My Noble Friend passed on that recommendation to the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, with a strong recommendation on his behalf that the visa should be refused. The Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs accepted the recommendation, and my Noble Friend has instructed me to explain to the House that he accepts full responsibility for the recommendation which he made. When the hon. Member went to India in 1926 he explained that the purpose of his journey was as follows. I am quoting from the statement which he made on applying for the passport: Settlement of important personal affairs and safeguarding the interests of my English-born children, and a family settlement of a Trust existing in India. Also a study of up-to-date political situation and atmosphere in India and of the present position of Indian labour in large industries of Empire importance. Further, the hon. Member said: I am now a fully domiciled British subject. Since 1907 I have had no home or address in India, nor my parents had any in the later stage of their lives, and on death both my parents have been buried in England. Since 1906 I have continually resided in England, except for two or three visits, 1912 and 1914, to India. My first contention is that the hon. Member's statement, unintentionally, no doubt, distinctly conveys the impression that he was going to India mainly for private business reasons and not for political reasons. [Interruption.] In point of fact, he made a long series of speeches in India, which the Government of India and my Noble Friend regarded as inflammatory, and it will be my duty to-night to quote to the House for their judgment some of the speeches which the hon. Member made, as reported in a number of Indian newspapers. Speaking at Bombay on the China situation on 6th February he asked his hearers to let the world know that Indians were being sent to China against the wishes of the whole of India to fight an unjust war. He reviewed in scathing terms Mr. Patel's acceptance of the Viceroy's decision to disallow the motion of adjournment of the Assembly to draw attention to the despatch of Indian troops to China. Mr. Patel is, of course, the President of the Legislative Assembly.

Mr. J. JONES

Quote Lord Birkenhead's speeches in Belfast.

Earl WINTERTON

In the course of a speech which he delivered at Karachi on 10th February, 1927, he spoke of Communism and, referring to a visit he had paid to the national schools at Nagpur, he said the boys in these schools should filter into mills, factories and all avenues of labour and should unobtrusively spread Communism in preparation for civil disobedience. The meaning of civil disobedience is disobedience to law. Speaking in Calcutta, when addressing the All-Bengal Young Men's Association, he said—[Interruption]—I am sure the hon. Member for Silvertown (Mr. J. Jones) will appreciate the fact that I have a case to answer.

Mr. J. JONES

On a point of Order.

HON. MEMBERS

Order!

Mr. SPEAKER

The hon. Member for Silvertown (Mr. J. Jones) must remember that some 35 minutes were taken in putting the case and only 10 minutes are left for a reply.

Mr. JONES

As we are having the quotation of speeches, I would like to know if we can quote similar speeches afterwards?

Earl WINTERTON

I am sure the sense of fairness of the hon. Member for Silvertown will allow me to make my statement in the few moments that are left to me. Speaking at Calcutta, the hon. Member urged young men to possess not only an open mind, not only a brave and courageous mind, not only an iconoclastic mind, but with it an almost revolutionary new mentality which would welcome any change. He called his audience's attention to the extreme youth of the boys serving in the Cantonese Army and participating in the British Communist movement, and recommended that the youth movement in India should link up with the Young Communist League in England under the title of the Young Comrades League of India. After a eulogistic reference to what he claimed had been done by the Soviet Government in Russia in the cause education, the hon. Member spoke on the Bengal Ordinance. He said that the Ordinance was not the only form of terrorism. If you had a burglar in your house you had to make up your mind to put your wife in a place of safety, go upstairs and turn the fellow out, fully prepared for the rough time which he would very likely give you. There was only one law in this country, and that was that Might would continue to be Right. He said that they could get Swaraj in a month; it required a revolutionary mind, a mind prepared to sacrifice everything, even life if required, for the sake of the country. If that is not an inflammatory appeal, I do not know what is. There are a great many other quotations which I could give from the hon. Gentleman's speeches, but I will now turn to the question of the pamphlet. I gather from the hon. Member's speech that he denies he wrote the foreword to this pamphlet. The pamphlet is here and I am prepared, if any hon. Member wishes, to lay it as a Paper in the Library. It is called "India and China. With a Foreword by Shapurji Saklatvala, M. P." Inside is the foreword: All I have to say to the people of India on this subject is 'Go and do likewise.' [Interruption.]

Perhaps the hon. Member will allow me to complete my sentence. He has taken up 35 minutes in delivering his case and has left me 12 minutes in which to deal with mine. If the hon. Member did not write the foreword, and if the statement on the pamphlet itself is a forgery, why did he not deny the fact weeks and months ago when Mr. Spratt, to whom he referred in his speech, was being tried, and when both the prosecuting and defending counsel accepted as a fact that the hon. Member did write the foreword; and will he now take legal action for the unauthorised use of his name against the gentleman who published the foreword? [Interruption.] Let me tell the House this: It is published by a gentleman who is a political associate of the hon. Member for North Battersea. The hon. Member knows perfectly well that he did write the foreword and sent it to Mr. Mirajker, who is the gentleman who published it. Does he deny it?

Mr. SAKLATVALA

I entirely deny it and say that in the pamphlet itself the sentence is culled from somewhere and put in in inverted commas.

Earl WINTERTON

If that is so I hope the hon. Gentleman will take action against—[Interruption.]

Mr. J. JONES

Why do you not take action? [Interruption.]

Mr. SPEAKER

I think hon. Members might allow the House to hear what the Minister says.

Mr. TOWNEND

Is it possible for any action to be taken?

Mr. SPEAKER

The Noble Lord is dealing with the denial of the hon. Member for North Battersea.

Earl WINTERTON

Of course, I accept the hon. Gentleman's statement that the statement on this pamphlet that he wrote the foreword is untrue, and all I say is that I hope he will take action. [HON. MEMBERS: "No; you take action!"] If the hon. Member is not prepared to take action against the friend who published the pamphlet with the foreword in it—[HON. MEMBERS: "It is a quotation!"] It is not a quotation. Will hon. Members allow me to read it? The pamphlet is published as follows: India and China With a foreword by Shapurji Saklatvala, M.P. I will make it my business to put a copy of this pamphlet in the Library so that the whole House can see it. [Interruption.] There is only one other point, and I have only a minute in which to deal with it. The hon. Member sent the following telegram of congratulation to a Communist who was convicted of a most serious offence, and who is now undergoing imprisonment. He says: The Communist party of Great Britain denounces the Government's sentence on the brave citizen Mr. Manchersha Avari, and offers congratulations to Sardar Avari and Captain Chatoorbai on the new movement against the Arms Act, and hopes that every true Congressman will join it. I say that in these circumstances the Government of India were fully justified in not allowing the hon. Gentleman to go to India and exacerbate the already serious situation there. Let me tell him that as long as he continues to take the action he has taken in the past in India, he will be refused a visa for his passport.

It being Half-past Eleven of the Clock, Mr. SPEAKER adjourned the House without Question, put.

Adjourned at Half after Eleven o'Clock.